


No Stars in the Sky Tonight

by Twinkletalon



Category: POKÉMON Detective Pikachu (2019)
Genre: Father-Son Relationship, Fluff, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Post-Canon, Spoilers, learning how to be a family again, or Tim gets the hug he deserves, this is post canon what did you expect
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-18
Updated: 2019-05-18
Packaged: 2020-03-07 03:35:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,538
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18864886
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Twinkletalon/pseuds/Twinkletalon
Summary: Things went back to normal after the event during the parade, for most people at least. For Tim Goodman, it ended up with him getting his father back, after thinking he was dead, then that he faked his death, then that he was—Well, it was a lot to take in.Now his dad's here and they need to talk, but there's some emotional baggage to go through first.





	No Stars in the Sky Tonight

Things went back to normal after the event. That’s what all the news outlets are calling it right now, the _event._ The half an hour time frame in which nearly the entire population of Ryme City turned into pokemon. The human population, that is. Everything was fine, the city itself sustained very little structural damage during the whole fiasco. But that didn’t mean that everyone was okay.

The pokemon population wasn’t faring much better. All over the city there was medical tents set up for everyone who got injured in the crowds, a large margin of them being pokemon. It’s not like the arcanines and machamps drugged up on R knew what they were doing, but it still led to the aftermath that Tim sees before him. Pokémon crowding the streets next to their partners. Not trainers, he reminds himself, partners. These people and their pokemon have been together for who knows how long, and then one old crazy millionaire had to go and mess it all up. 

He sighs as he dutifully tugs at the arm draped over his shoulder. The man next to him startled a little and slowly turns his face over to see Tim. Harry Goodman’s face, his father’s face, stares into his eyes as though they’ve never seen them before. 

He was pretty shocked after “waking up” from what he thought was a deadly car accident only to find his son crying in his arms, telling that he’s been looking for him for days and that he’s finally here again...yeah, that was definitely not Tim’s best moment. 

It took quite a while to get his father up to speed on what had happened, and to explain all the exploded pokemon balloons lying around. Not that Tim could ask anyone else for help. Lucy left to go prepare for her upcoming night live news broadcast on what they found relating to the investigation. Mewtwo flew off as soon as it determined that Harry was fully human again, and who knows where it is now. Which leaves pikachu, who is now just the same as every other pokemon. Unable to verbally communicate and very tired out from this whole ordeal. Pikachu was currently occupying the arm that wasn’t support his father, its hat still stuck firmly on its head. 

There wasn’t much to talk about on their way back to the apartment. The ‘how are you’s got pretty old fast after you’d heard them five times in a row. Harry (because Tim hasn’t thought of his father in years, much less called him his dad) tried valiantly to start up a conversation, but much to his dismay Tim wasn’t very much in the mood for talking. 

Maybe tomorrow, when the neon lights of the city aren’t blaring into his eyeballs and the frantic yelling of desperate people searching for their pokemon stop hurting his ears. 

Maybe tomorrow, when he can finally stop hearing Harry’s voice and thinking ‘pikachu’. 

They had it back to the apartment in one piece. Getting up the stairs to the second floor is the hardest part of the whole ordeal considering how exhausted the three of them are. Both Tim and Harry reach for their two copies of the key at the same time, but Tim quietly says it’s fine and opens the door himself. 

Of all the things he expected his father to say when they got back home, it wasn’t this. 

“Why are there shot sized paper cups all over the floor?” Harry rubbed at his eyes, trying to unsee the chaos laid before him. 

Tim tried (and failed) to hide his laughter. “You’re not going to question the massive amount of papers on the floor while you’re at it?” 

“No the papers I understand, I was a detective you know.” He says, then slowly untangles himself from Tim’s support. Pikachu finally wakes up from its long nap and perks up when it sees where they are. 

“You excited to finally be back, Pikachu?” Harry asks. 

“Pikaa!” It replies, then jumps off of Tim and starts running around the room as though it was taking account of everything it saw. No wonder he made a great partner for the detective. 

“At least Pikachu’s excited.” Tim mumbles, and walks over to the kitchenette to get a glass of water. Lugging a man twice his age and his pikachu around was harder than it looked. Harry gingerly sat down on the thankfully uncluttered couch and almost fell asleep then and there. 

Tim took one glance at the man’s lidded eyes, his gaze trailed over the paper cups scattered on the floor, and started brewing a pot of coffee. 

The night went by faster after that. Ignoring the sound of sirens in the night, the hustle and bustle of Pokémon (which never seemed to change, even after the _event_ ), and the old detective movie reruns on the tv, it was quiet in the apartment. Before they knew it, the old grandfather clock (because of course Harry had one of those) struck nine o’clock.

Suddenly, the tv changed from a relatively calm black and white detective movie to a loud technicolor news broadcast. 

The newscaster, a face he vaguely remembers seeing in the crowds of the parade, begins to speak. “This just in, we have the full report of the event that happened earlier today in our very own Ryme city. The event that will be remembered for generations to come—“

Tim stopped listening after a while. It was just describing what had happened. The parade was just beginning (he had been panicking), everyone was happy (he was in the penthouse talking to Howard), the balloons exploded (he fought a ditto), and everyone got turned into pokemon (he almost fell off of a building). He knew what happened, he could never forget what happened, and he doubted anybody else would either. 

Harry meanwhile, was watching with his full attention, coffee almost forgotten in his hand. Pikachu curled up at his side, every so often nudging him with its head to remind him for pets. Tim’s attention was focused on them before a new voice broke his train of thought. 

There on the tv was Lucy, decked out in a fancy business suit and her hair styled into a loose bun. Roger, the bastard who had not a day before brushed her story off completely, stood proudly at her side (like he deserves any of the credit for what they went through). Then she started talking about what they had been investigating together, the laboratory, the genetic experiments, and the spread of the R drug through the underground fighting rings. 

It was surreal to Tim, hearing everything that they had gone through together told in a matter of fact, newscaster voice. She was a great reporter, thorough in her descriptions of the events but not boring to listen too. But it was too soon, so soon that he couldn’t stand it. Couldn’t stand how much more exposed it made him feel, to hear about Harry’s apparently faked death like it was some sort of mistake, like all the emotions he felt on the train to Ryme City were fake! That what he went though was over—

“Tim,” He heard, snapping him out of his spiraling thoughts. “You alright buddy?” 

“Pika?”

He wiped away the growing tears in his eyes and sighed, “Yeah, _yeah_ I’m fine. Just—I just need some water. Then I’ll get out of your way.” 

Harry rose from the couch and turned off the tv as he walked over to where Tim was leaning against the wall. “You’d never be bothering us kiddo, you know that right?” 

“Of course.” He didn’t know that for sure. 

Harry didn’t look like he believed it, but didn’t press the issue any further. Tim ended up going back to the kitchen to get a glass of water, and to calm himself down. 

When he walked back to the couch, Lucy’s section of the news report had probably ended, and instead the old detective movie was back on the screen. Harry had turned to look out of the window into the cloudy night sky. Tim tried to subtly sit down next to them without them noticing, and failed. He was never really good at stealth. 

Pikachu hopped out of Harry’s lap and landed on Tim’s shoulders. It persistently rubbed it’s face on his cheek, which despite having touched before Tim could never remember just how soft it’s fur actually was. 

“I think he’s asking for you to pet him, kid.” Harry said, with a soft smile on his face. 

Tim stuttered, “I don’t—I don’t think it wants—“

“He wants.” Harry corrected. He not so kindly glared at his father, before realizing he was trying to have a staring competition with a detective. 

Tim replied, “I don’t think he likes me that much. No pokemon ever do.” He’s reminded of all the times pokemon have rejected him over the years. There was the cubone that tried to attack him the day he left for Ryme City. But before that there was the spearow that would always fly away from him, the zubat that bit his arm when he tried to grab it, the eevee that ran away from him, the poliwag that spit water at him; the list goes on and on. After no pokemon ever accepted his request to be their trainer his dreams of becoming a Pokémon master went up in flames. Just like his shirt after a growlithe got mad at him for throwing a pokeball at it. Tim could never win when it came to pokemon. 

It makes sense then, that the only Pokémon who he could ever work with turned out to be a human in disguise, his father no less. 

“Have you met every single pokemon in the world, Tim?” Harry asks. 

“What?” He says, confused. He repeats the question. “I—No I haven’t, that’d be ridiculous.” 

“It’d be just as ridiculous as saying that every single pokemon in the world hates you Tim. You just haven’t found the right partner yet.” 

“That’s just it, I did find them! I found a partner who accepted me for who I was! I found—“ _you._ Was what he didn’t, what he couldn’t, say out loud. He found Harry. His father, his dad was the one partner he never expected to find ever again. 

“You found who Tim?” 

This was the moment. This was when he would reveal the bombshell to his father, that actually he hadn’t been in a coma during the past couple of days and that he had also been turned into a pokemon like the rest of the city by mewtwo. That he had traveled all around the city and out in order to solve a mystery with Tim like he’s always wanted too. That Tim would never be able to look at his pikachu the same after hearing Harry’s voice coming out—

“No one.” Was what came out of his mouth instead. “I’ll tell you tomorrow.” He can’t keep it from Harry forever, but it can wait for a little bit. It can wait. 

“Alright.” His father said. Who knew he would be so open to dropping subjects after all these years. Tim has made the assumption that his father would be overbearing in the long absence, constantly asking him how his live was and what he was doing. Instead, after the initial excitement at the site of the parade, his father backed off. He was silent as he finished his coffee and sat back down on the couch with a huff. It was calming and nerve wracking at the same time. Tim didn’t know what to do. 

“Don’t be a stranger.” Harry said, and patted the open seat next to him. 

Tim sighed and went against his gut feelings to open the front door and get as far away from this situation as possible. His shoulders soon got assaulted by Pikachu again, but his struggle to readjust to the extra weight led to him leaning further and further into Harry’s side that he had in years. When he realized where he was he froze. Harry didn’t move either, and it was nearly a full minute before Pikachu decided to break the silence. 

“Pikaa pi! Pikachu!” the pokemon yelled at the two of them. 

Harry broke out the trance first. “Alright Pikachu, I’ll ask him! Just quick down for me will ya?” 

“Pika” he said triumphantly. 

“Ask me what?” Tim hesitantly asks. 

“Will you—No that’s not it.” Harry opens his mouth, but nothing comes out. He chuckles a bit. Then he takes a huge breath in and let’s it go. “Can I give you a hug?” 

That throws Tim for a loop. “What, why?” 

His father sighed, “I just, we haven’t seen each other in so long! It’s terrible that it’s this tragedy that brought us together, but after so long I finally get to see my son again!” He finishes with a bright grin on his face, and Pikachu nods from Tim’s shoulders. 

There’s that word, son. “Y-you still consider me your son?” 

He scoffs, “Of course kiddo! I’m your dad, and you have so many accomplishments ahead of you! I’m just glad that I have a chance to be a part of it again.” 

“Even when it’ll amount to basically nothing?” Tim tries to joke. 

“It isn’t nothing Tim. What you’ve brought into the world matters to more than just yourself. It matters to everyone around you, myself definitely included. I couldn’t be more proud of you, son.” 

He didn’t know what to say. 

“I guess I went a little overboard with that huh kid?” Harry—dad—rubs the back of his neck, a nervous tick Tim remembers seeing a lot in his childhood. 

“It’s just—a lot all at once.” he tries to get out, not without a few voice cracks. 

His dad laughs, glances at Pikachu (who Tim can feel nodding his head while sitting on his shoulders), and slowly opens his arms out wide. It dawns on him that in this moment, he can’t remember the last time that he’s had a real hug. One where you feel like your back’s going to break due to the pressure that you love that person with. The feeling of being trapped in somebody else's arms but accepting it wholeheartedly. His mom had always loved hugs, and had called them the physical embodiment of love. Tim never thought that she could be wrong. 

“Y-you still offering that hug?” He could feel tears running down his cheeks. 

“Of course Tim, come here.” Dad said softly, nudging him closer. But Tim was faster. As soon as the words left his mouth, he had lunged into his father’s arms, allowing himself to feel like he did years ago, crying to his dad about something or other that happened at school, or with his friends, or anything really. His dad was always there for him when he needed it. He wasn’t able to be that person for years, but now that he has this back, it excites a feeling of hopefulness within him. 

Tim will never take the time he gets with his dad for granted ever again.

**Author's Note:**

> so I saw Detective Pikachu last week but I have so many contradicting ideas and theories about the ending that it's made it impossible for me to think of a good plot for a fanfic, so here's fluff instead! Good luck to anyone going through exam season right now, like me, and I hope you have a nice day! Thanks for reading!!


End file.
